Acrylonitrile-butadiene-styrene (hereinafter referred to as “ABS”) resin is widely used in automotive products, electrical and electronic products, office equipment, and the like due to stiffness and chemical resistance of acrylonitrile and processability, mechanical strength and aesthetically pleasing appearance of butadiene and styrene.
ABS resin, which is generally prepared by emulsion polymerization, may be used as a general, flame retardant, extruded, heat-resistant, or transparent material, or the like depending upon the properties of a mixed matrix resin. More particularly, ABS resin may be used as a special material such as a material for plating or painting. Especially, in the case of a material for plating, rubber particles included in ABS resin are removed by chemical etching to form anchor holes. The formed anchor holes are plated with a metallic plating film. Here, plating adhesion, which is one of important properties, is determined by the shape of formed anchor holes, i.e., how well the shapes of removed rubber particles are maintained. However, the anchor holes may be deformed under a high shear condition, such as an injection molding process, and such deformed anchor holes may cause decrease in plating adhesion of a material for plating. In connection with this, research into reducing deformation of anchor holes using a method of increasing a gel content in rubber particles, a method of maximizing a graft rate of an ABS resin, etc. is underway. However, the method of increasing a gel content is inefficient because it directly causes decrease in graft efficiency of ABS resin and thus lowers dispersibility, etc. In addition, the method of maximizing a graft rate is disadvantageous in that chemical resistance is poor.
Therefore, there is a need for development of a material having both superior plating adhesion and chemical resistance by reducing deformability under the aforementioned high shear condition.